Cézanne (P. Cézanne) - The Large Bathers

The Large Bathers, 127×196 cm, 1990-1905, National Gallery, London. Throughout his life, Cézanne worked on many "bathing scenes." These two Large Bathers represent the culmination of his exploration of bathers. They are particularly rich and brilliant; the novel imagery and symbols of the bathing women foreshadowed Cubism (such as Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon) and Matisse's exploration in The Large Bathers. Clearly, "bathing scenes" are a subject in Western traditional painting, such as Titian's famous Concert Champêtre from the Venetian school, Boucher's Diana Emerging from Her Bath from the French Rococo period, and Manet's famous Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe, among others. Incorporating nude figures into landscapes is a tradition of classical painting, where the object presents a harmonious balance of nature and the human form.

In these two Large Bathers, Cézanne replaced the inherent classical viewpoint with visuality. The diverse variations of the bathing groups are completely integrated into the natural landscape to construct the scene. He transformed these bodies, tree trunks, clouds, and ground into modernist formal elements—imagery-symbols, lines-surfaces, and colors-volumes—building rigorous structures and extraordinary spaces. The Large Bathers became the pinnacle of Cézanne's lifelong creative work and the crystallization of pure form, pointing a clear path for 20th-century modernism.

These two monumental Large Bathers are each composed of two groups of bathing women set against a verdant green field scene under blue skies and white clouds. In the Philadelphia version, within a highly perfect structure, two groups of bathers are positioned beneath thick tree trunks. On the left, one woman stands while four squat on the ground (note that the face of the figure in the foreground is missing). This group forms the right side of the composition alongside another group of bathers in sitting, lying, squatting, and standing poses. One woman converses with the left group, leaving space in the center. The viewer's gaze travels from the river they occupy, through the figures, to the distant forest farmstead, following the perspective depth of traditional Western landscape painting.

The Large Bather at the National Gallery in London is constructed even more boldly, clearly resulting from the exploration of the Philadelphia version. The same bathing women (minus the central figure of the Philadelphia painting) sit, lie, squat, and stand arranged in a single plane (closing off traditional perspective), leisurely resting under the shade of trees. Both unfold under the rhythm of harmonious and perfect primary tones of ochre, green, and blue. Especially under Cézanne's vivid brushwork, color becomes the body of the painting. The Philadelphia Large Bather has light colors with a watercolor effect, while the National Gallery version features solid, robust colors that reinforce "color-volume." Here, Cézanne completed his lifelong exploration: "Artistic harmony is similar to nature." Perfection was not enough.